Many Mothers' Series
by Vashti
Summary: Max had his reasons for leaving Furiousa and the Widows behind after the Citadel was taken and Old Joe deposed. Her Mothers have their reasons for calling him back.
1. Gathering In

**Title:** Gathering In  
**Series:** Many Mothers  
**Author:** Vashti  
**Fandom:** Mad Max: Fury Road, BtVS  
**Character(s):** Max, Original Characters  
**Rating:** PG/FR13  
**Summary:** They come roaring out of the smoke and sand, but who they were there for-the wastelands, Max, or themselves-he couldn't say.  
**Length:** ~1,320  
**Disclaimer:** Only the words are mine, and that's probably up for philosophical debate.  
**Dedication:** the TwistedShorts Fic-A-Day ficathon, because I'm pretty sure I would have never written this without it  
**Notes:** Written for the August 2019 TwistedShorts FAD over on livejournal. It's been revised for clarity, but it's mostly unchanged. Like, seriously, this one is virtually unchanged.

* * *

Max took a breath and fired.

Took another breath and fired.

Took another breath and fired.

Took another breath and fired.

Turned, breathed, fired.

Dropped the empty shotgun hot in his hands and reached for the second, already loaded on the seat beside him.

Breathed. Fired.

Breathed. Fired.

Turned. Fired. Breathed. Fired. Turned. Breathed. Fired.

New gun.

Fired. Fired. Fired.

Opened his mouth to breath-to scream-

But it wasn't his voice he heard. The ululating war cry he heard carried on the hot wind didn't come from his throat. Couldn't have. The last time he'd heard a sound like this, it had been on the Fury Road, a hundred days or more behind him.

For half a breath he thought it might be Furiosa. Then the thought blew away with the wind-born sand. She and the Widows and the Old Women had a Citadel to subdue, and a Green Place to rebuild.

Max's hands scrambled about in the seat beside him, feeling for ammo for the shot gun or any of the extra guns. Whichever his hands landed on first. The wasteland rats pinning him down wouldn't be distracted for long. And it might be backup that was coming.

Max scanned the horizon, and reloaded. Breathed in time with the pulsing fires of burning wasteland rigs, and reloaded. Watched the newcomers come roaring in, and reloaded. Scanned them from his hidey-hole, gun ready...and waited.

Not for long. War cries still rising from their throats, the newcomers-all women like in Furiosa's Green Place-leapt off their rigs and charged the wastelanders.

Shock almost made Max drop his shotgun. Their rigs were small and light and fast—more frame than vehicle. They maneuvered well. They drove with purpose. Who was stupid enough to get _out_ of their rig to fight on the sand? Against guns? And crazy wastelanders? Some of them lancers?

Max's own weapon was up again in seconds. Once the women were torn to shreds, the wastelanders would come back for him. If he was lucky, raiding the women's rigs would distract them for a few minutes. It might be enough time to scarper down from his hidey-hole, disengage the kill switch on his own ride and get back on the road.

But it wasn't the women that were going down. Armed with only their melee weapons and their bare hands, moving under their own power, it should have been a slaughter. And it was. The sand turned dark with blood and ichor. Smoke from burning rigs nearly blocked out the sun. Not so much that he couldn't see the women advancing on his position.

He fired a warning shot. They'd taken out the wasteland rats, and for that he was grateful, but not enough to roll over for them.

Instead of rushing him as they probably should have, the women circled each other in a tight knot. The roaring fires and billowing smoke muffled their conversation and partially hid them from view. Max kept watching anyway. Watching and breathing.

Watching and breathing as the women broke ranks, their circle opening to allow one woman to come forward.

Max's eyes flit between the one woman and the many women. As she came closer, though, it became hard to target both. He chose her. His eyes would notice if they began to rush him, even if he wasn't giving them all his full attention.

Even from his hidey hole-a crag in the cliff face someone had supplied with seats and a repurposed door that had come from rounded-edged rig-Max could see that she was tiny. Tiny and brown like Toast, hair bright as old new pennies like Capable.

"You Max the Fool?"

Sure confidence like the Dag.

"Who's askin'?" Not many people left that knew his name. None alive, at least.

Except in the Green Place.

"Our Mother sent us to fetch you."

Max felt his eyebrows shoot up. Had Furiosa and the Widows alreadhy remade the Citadel into their Green Place? The old ones who had survived, the Vuvalini, had the knowledge. And the grit if they'd lasted so long.

"Been lookin' for you for ages," she continued. "Shoulda took Furiosa's advice all along."

"What was that?" Max shouted down.

"'Find a fight that looks absolutely mad and somewhere'll be that fool, Max.'"

Well, if that wasn't an open invitation.

Still. It wasn't in Max to just give over. He waited. Wrestling silently with the decision to expose himself. The brown-skinned redhead sat down in the sand. Behind her, the other women finally wandered off-some to their rigs, others to raid or finish off the wastelander machines.

The normalness of it all bothered Max more than the woman did. "Just gonna sit?" he called out.

"You comin' down then?" She straightened. "Or ya need me to come up an' help pack up a bit?"

Max scowled. Growled a little.

"Guess not then." So she slumped again, eventually sinking down to one elbow. The other women started to bring her odds and ends, but they spoke too low for him to tell if they were showing off or asking questions about their finds.

Max scowled again, this time at himself. Women were not...appreciated. Not anymore. Before Furiosa and her Many Mothers, Max had never heard of a tribe of them living independent and good. They were used up like every other wastelander, or bartered like goods, or hidden in tightly locked boxes like the Widows, they were fodder for scavs or worse. Yet here was evidence of it. Daughters of the new Green Place.

Max pushed open the door over his hidey-hole. The sound brought every head up, but only the redhead moved towards him. The rest went back to whatever they had been doing. "Y'good? Don't need help, then?"

"Good." He gave her a sharp nod as he navigated the way down-not as easy as up-with a bag across his chest, another in hand, and his bum knee making it all the more precarious. She didn't offer her help again. He appreciated it.

Once he was down, though, she did reach for the bag. It had the guns and the ammo, though, so he slung the bag across his back over his head. She stepped into it so that it went over her head and over her shoulders in the same swing like it was a move they'd practiced for over a thousand days. When she looked up she was grinning.

"The Mother'll be so pleased."

"How... How is... Furiosa? The Wives. Widows."

"Sisters," she said, then shrugged. "They're all alright, I guess. Looked good 'for all'a us was sent out."

"She's called the Mother now?"

The woman frowned at him. At his expectant look, she said, "Who? Furiosa?"

Max grunted.

"Furiosa?" She laughed in shocked surprise. "She's not even 10,000 days old. Honored Furiosa is, but the Mother?" She laughed in earnest. "Can't wait to see the look on both their faces when you says that to'em."

She turned and walked away. Max watched her go. She turned, and the hands on her hips reminded him more of Toast than the brown of her skin. "You coming, or'm I telling the Mother you're out."

He should. He should tell this crazy Green Place warrior that he'd had enough of strangers and strange women. He had enough of that in his dreams and waking nightmares. There was a reason he'd walked away from Furiosa and the Wido-Sisters. There was a reason he was in the wastes, even with the scavs and the wasteland rats. There was a reason.

With a grunt, Max hoisted the bag with the guns and the ammo over his shoulder and followed the woman.

She was just another woman. Just another Vuvalini. And Furiosa wouldn't have sent for him if she didn't need him.

The brown-skinned redhead's smile was purely her own as she fell into step beside him.

"Know my name," Max said. "What do I call you?"

"For now, Slayer."

Fin[ite]

* * *

**Notes2:** Noooo idea what inspired this one. And then it, like, kept going. Without me! I had a vague plan, and it kept going wherever it wanted to without me. What am I talking about, you wonder? You'll see in the next 3 stories. All written during the 2019 FAD, so they're done, just in need of revising.

Also, the story title may change. I am so not in love with it.


	2. Skin Medicine

**Title:** Skin Medicine  
**Character(s):** Max, OC Slayer  
**Rating:** PG  
**Summary:** Slayer and the other Green Place women warriors are almost too much for Max to bear.  
**Length:** ~950 words  
**Notes:** Written as part of the August 2019 FAD. It's been edited for clarity but is largely unchanged.

* * *

There was a time when Max would have asked the young woman driving next to him, what she meant by saying to call her Slayer. Back before he'd've had her pegged for a gang member or, more likely then, the stupid girlfriend of a gang member - stupid for being involved with any bloke in a gang.

Back before... Max, he'd've pegged himself for a gang heavy dressed as he was...dirty and beaten and carrying a bag of guns as he was.

Around him, the lightweight Green Place rigs swerved and turned and curved, dancing around the rig Slayer drove. Their occupants whooped and shouted, loud as any war party Max had the misfortune of crossing. Sometimes they tossed their strange ululating cry between them like a ball in a game. Sometimes they carried it along as they drove their patterns, so that it wove a sonic net around Slayer's rig. There was at least one hour when they drove no pattern, except to keep Slayer's rig in the center, and merely chatted loud enough to be heard over the wind and their engines.

Slayer said little. Max said less. She asked him hardly anything at all, which he appreciated. She accepted his mumbles for the answers they were, didn't try to touch his gear, showed him where were the aqua-cola was stored, and watched his back from a careful distance when he had to take a whizz (a favor which he returned).

Max couldn't have asked for a better driver. All that was needed to make it perfect was for him to be driving, but he didn't know the way (not yet), and he couldn't promise that he wouldn't turn Slayer's rig around, and drive them in the other direction.

It's not until they stop for the night that Max learns how young some of these Green Place warrior women are. They'd been too far away to see distinct-like when they'd ridden to his rescue at the cliffs. After Slayer had coaxed him out of his hidey-hole, they'd kept their distance. Even when they'd stopped to swap drivers or take a piss, none had come too close, busy handling their own business. Now he could see they were not all young women like Slayer. Some were genuinely girls-5000 days maybe, but one was barely that.

And all unmarked.

The health in Slayer's cheeks, the strength of her hands, the muscles that played beneath her clothes as she moved, and her mouth full of strong white teeth spoke of foreignness, more than her Toast brownness and Capable red hair. The five unmarked Wido-Sisters emerging from the back of Furiosa's war rig had been an impossible vision. Six, counting Furiosa herself. The Vuvalini they'd met on the road had only numbered seven total, and Max could only speak to the health of three.

Here, ranging from 5000 to 7000 days old, were at least thirty healthy people. Thirty healthy women of childbearing age. Max's mind flashed to Jesse and the sprog, to the heavily pregnant Splendid and newly pregnant Dag, to motherless Gloria. Cheedo's face flashed before him, sweet and frightened of the burning world.

(At some point Splendid and her unborn sprog had joined his gallery of waking nightmares twelve days out of the new Green Place.)

Max stopped in his tracks. A cold sweat broke out all over his body.

Slayer immediately noticed, and turned. "You a'right there, raggedy man?"

The faces kept move through his mind's eye. No. He wasn't a'right. But he couldn't say it.

"Max? Fool!" Slayer grabbed his arm and instinct took over.

Max twisted his arm to break her hold and disable her. Slayer moved fluidly to counter.

They were fighting before Max remembered where he was and who he was fighting and why. "Slayer," he breathed.

His moment of lost focus got him knocked into the sand, a knee in his spine. "Returned have ya?"

"Yeah." Max flopped cheek-first into the sand, laughing as best he could with a knee in his back.

Slayer eased off him. "Sure?" The skepticism was clear in his voice and clearer on her face when he rolled over. She offered him his hand.

The grunt he gave her as she pulled him up was his answer. She seemed satisfied. "Was gonna invite you out huntin' with us, but maybe tonight ain't it, yeah? Some'a the girls is stayin' behind no matter what, watch the vehicles, watch the gears. Theres days and days ahead of us. Maybe another day is better for goin' with us, yeah?"

Probably he should have bristled at the suggestion that he couldn't go, but mostly Max felt relief. He wasn't ready. Not tonight. Let these wild, unmarked warrior women feed their wandering clan. Tomorrow...

Max could feel his head and shoulders slowly dropping as he nodded. He hadn't driven one mile (his rig was tied behind Slayers) but he was as tired. So tired. It had been a hundred days or more since he'd had someone he could trust at his back.

"I'll stay."

"Good," Slayer said, stepping into his space. "We needed someone experienced to stay behind." But before he could tense she had her hands on his shoulders and her forehead pressed to his. Even with his head down, she had to tiptoe to reach him. She did not retreat immediately, seemingly content to hang between. Max watched her through his eyelashes for a moment, watched her breath, then closed his eyes and breathed with her, his own hands coming rest on her shoulders.

One of Slayer's hands snaked up to the back of his head, pressing them closer. "Furiosa said you was a raggedy man, but you're gonn' be five by five. You'll see."

Fin[ite]

* * *

**Notes2:** I really thought this would be a 2-shot at best...


	3. Everywhere We Go

**Title:** Everywhere We Go  
**Character(s):** _ the Vampire Slayer, the Vuvalini, Cheedo the Fragile  
**Rating:** PG  
**Summary:** Like many an older person, the Mother hasn't fully adapted to the modern era. Not that she was ever known for adapting herself to the people, places and things around her. More like steam-rolling over them...  
**Length:** ~925 words  
**Notes:** Written for the 2019 FAD. Revised for clarity and such, but it's otherwise unchanged.  
**Trigger Warning:** references to sexual assault. If you've not seen the movies you might actually miss it.

* * *

"It's been three weeks. More. What's taking them so long?"

When this pronouncement was met with a persistent silence instead of sane reasoning, suggestions to get a war-party together, or even a huffy sigh, the silver-haired woman known best as the Mother leaned heavily on her walking stick and turned to the group behind her.

"What did I say?"

The only other old women in the room, the Vuvalini, burst into uncontrolled laughter.

The Mother scowled. She would have also put her hands on her hips, but the walking stick had stopped being an affectation long ago. Instead she swore, which seemed to disturb the younger women in the room, but the two old biddies managed to sober. A little.

"We stopped tracking time for longer than a day more than 20,000 days ago," one of them said between her sniggers.

"I could barely tell time before!" the Mother huffed. "Why don't you younger Slayers know what I'm talking about?"

"You forget, they're not all ours," said the other Vuvalini, far more soberly.

The Mother threw up the hand not grasping her walking stick. "Then one of you translate. I'm an old woman. Shouldn't you be taking care of me?"

Which set off both Vuvalini again.

"I swear I-"

"Mother." The sweet voice of a young woman taller than the Mother stopped her tirade before it could get started. "I... I know the times and seasons."

The Mother squinted at the tall child who had separated herself from others. "You're a kid. How d'you know the old words?"

"We... We had a History Woman."

"I didn't see nothin' but Wretched down below," the Mother challenged.

The young woman swallowed and seemed almost as if she would go back. Then she swallowed again and squared her shoulders. "Old Joe provided one for us. To teach us pretty things and about the world according to his making. But she was a real History Woman. She taught us to read the word burgers-books," the young woman corrected herself at the Mother's raised eyebrows. "Miss Giddy taught us to read books. And about the world that was."

"So you're one of Old Joe's pretty little Wives." The Mother turned and spat.

The young woman's spine straightened. "We were not his wives."

The Mother smiled, a dangerous kind of joy written across her heavily lined face. "There we go. That's what I'm looking for. Sure, honey, you can translate for me. Stop those two old broads from laughing at an even older broad's expense."

Which had the two in question giggling behind their hands like a pair of children.

The Mother rolled her eyes and sighed. "This is what I get for mocking Giles all those years," she muttered. Wisely, no one who could hear her tried to respond. "Can we get back on topic here, people? Where is Abundance? It's been three weeks..."

The young woman stared at her, waiting for the Mother to continue before remembering that she was acting as translator. "Um, that's..." Her lips moved as she did the math. "...21 days or more?" Her eyes swung between the Mother and the Vuvalini.

"Sounds good to me, kid."

"Sure," and "That's good," came from the other two old women.

"It's been 21 days," the Mother began again, "and no Abundance and no sign of Furiosa's Fool."

"His name is Max," said the young woman.

"Max. Right." The Mother waved a negligent hand as if their quarry's name didn't matter. Then she turned sharp eyes on her new translator. "What's your name? No way I'm calling you Sister. Had enough of that to last every lifetime I got."

Mumbling, the young woman ducked her head.

"Come again? My hearing's not what it used to be."

The Vuvalini sniggered behind their hands until the Mother shot then a quelling look.

Head still bowed, the young woman whispered, "They call me Cheedo the Fragile."

"What was that? Cheeto Fracturable? What kind of name is that?"

"No, Mother," she said a little more loudly, eyes still to the dusty floor. "Cheedo. Cheedo the Fragile."

With her eyes down as they were, Cheedo didn't see the Mother cross the distance between them to grasp her chin. The Mother manipulated the young woman until she had stooped to the Mother's height, but was looking at her eye to eye. "Your name might be Cheedo, but you don't ever call yourself the Fragile again. And don't let anyone else do it. Because anyone who can survive what you did? And keep going? Not what I'd ever call fragile. Y'got that?"

Cheedo nodded, eyes wide. The fire she saw in the Mother stripped days-years-from the older woman. "Yes, Mother."

"Big strapping girl like yourself," the Mother said as she released the young woman's chin. She gently slapped the girl's face. "You up for being my assistant?"

"A-assisstant?"

"I can't count on Frick and Frack over there. All they do is give me lip!"

The Vuvalini cackled and grinned, not at all repentant.

"I need someone to go with me places. Translate. Be my legs when I'm tired, my eyes when they're cloudy, and remembers stuff better than I ever did." The Mother leaned on her walking stick and carefully eyed Cheedo, once again standing at her full height. "Think you can do it?"

"I... I don't..."

The Mother's eyebrows and chin both went up.

"Yes, I... I can do it. I can be your assistant."

The Mother crowed. "Wicked cool. Let's do this, kid. Cheedo the Strong. You ready to be strong?"

"I... I... Yes. Yes I am."

Fin[ite]

* * *

**Notes2:** When I first started writing this story I had the crazy idea that my muse would finally get on track with the vague overarching plot I was cobbling together - one that should have been hashed out in the previous story. I should have known that adding Buffy/Faith would through a mystical monkey wrench into my plans.


	4. Get Up

**Title:** Get Up (and Put Your War Clothes On)  
**Character(s):** Max, OC Slayers, Buffy Summers, Faith  
**Rating:** PG-13/FR-15  
**Summary:** Max and the Green Place warriors make it back to the Citadel in time for a battle.  
**Length:** ~1185 words  
**Notes:** written for the August 2019 FAD. This was the last story I wrote for August, but it's not the last story in the series. I hope (like, fingers crossed and prayer-hands hope) that I can wrap this all up in one more story, but I've been saying that for about 3 stories, so don't count on me.

* * *

Max tapped Slayer's shoulder. "They with you," he shouted over the roar of her engine.

Slayer shot him a sharp look. "I can see the dust but can't see vehicles. Whatsit lookin'?"

So Max described the rigs he could see. He wasn't even halfway through when that ululating Green Place war-cry tore from her throat. Suddenly their rig was leaping ahead of the others. The cry was picked up, car by car, as they passed, until they were as wild and raucous as Old Joe's war party. And Max and Slayer were the tip of the lancer's spear.

He could see the question in her eyes whenever she glanced over at him, but Slayer never stopped her war cry. Her rig never slowed.

"Be faster if I drive my own rig."

Slayer nodded sharply.

Max wasted no time in climbing out of her lightweight vehicle, and scooting to the back. Straddling both, he undid the simple latch that kept the two rigs together, quickly scrambling across the hood of his Interceptor as it continued to roll, the Green Place warriors zipping past. Everything was where he'd left them-supplies thrown into the back, guns and ammo on the front seat. And there was more than enough guzz in the tank to get him back to the Citadel with the rest.

Max floored it, chasing Slayers rig...and whoever was attacking their new Green Place.

* * *

"Max! Down!"

He dropped into a painful crouch, ignoring his knee in favor of keeping himself from getting new holes.

He had somehow acquired a machete along with his gun. It had already saved his life more than once. They'd fought their way up to the top of the Citadel, climbing a series of unconnected internal stairs, dusty and painfully dry from disuse.

All around him Green Place warriors fought the invaders in the tight corridors.

Max popped up, impaling a dirty, half-painted War Boy. The invaders seemed to be a hodge-podge of Bullet Budgers, War Boy survivors and wasteland rats.

"Bullet Farmer tryna take whats ours," Toast had growled at them when they had caught up with her down in the armory.

"Don't know who he's up 'gainst," Slayer had responded, a feral light in her eyes. She and Toast had grasped necks and bumped heads before Slayer turned out of the room.

"Good to have you back, Fool," Toast had said, wrapping the machete around his waist along with a bandolier of ammo while he wasn't looking.

"Max."

"Live and I'll remember. Die and I won't care." Then she'd grabbed his neck and smacked their heads together before pushing him away.

The armory was the best guarded area of the Citadel, after Old Joe's room and the gardens high above. It had once been the treasury, near the bottom of the tower, with it's own hidden air shaft and fresh flowing water.

Slayer, the Green Place warriors and Max had been fighting their way up ever since.

"Max! Take point!" one of the Green Place warriors shouted. It might have been Slayer, but just as likely not. The two of them had been trading leads, but all the young women knew his name-and his skill.

He led the way into the next room.

And almost got a blackened wooden staff through his gut. Some instinct honed out of long survival pulled him back. Not before he took a blow to the chest though.

Which was quickly followed a strike to his arm, and a blow to the solar plexus. Max was coughing and on his knees in seconds. He felt the air shift as whoever had attacked him geared up for a blow meant to kill.

"Mother Buffy, no!" That was Slayer. "It's Max the Fool. He's with us."

The blow never came. "Furiosa's boo bear?"

Still trying to breath, Max looked up at his attacker. She was as old as any of the Vuvalini, probably older. Her face was deeply line and weather-beaten, but her green eyes were sharp and sparkling. Like the other Green Place warriors, she seemed to be physically perfect except for her advanced age. Max couldn't remember the last time he'd seen so many elders, genuine elders, alive and well.

Mother Buffy whistled. "Furiosa's got good taste. If I was a hundred years younger, we'd have to talk. But right now, we've got a city to save.

"Aby, how's it looking?"

Slayer-or Aby-quickly gave Mother Buffy their current status. "Good," she said in response. "You guys came back just in time. We've got the skills, but they've got numbers. This would've gone all darkness-before-the-dawn if you hadn't shown up."

Max stared, but Slayer Aby gave her a fierce grin. "The Mothers are always drilling us about timing."

"Last minute is the best minute?"

Slayer Aby's grin only grew.

"Alright, alright! We've got work to do. Take Max, Libby-"

"Lavvy-"

"Whatever, and Thyme up to Faith and the others, and guard that door!"

"Yes, ma'am!" Aby sprinted out of the room to get the other two.

Struggling to his feet, Max said, "You're their Mother."

Mother Buffy made a rude sound. "Try again next decade, Tall, Dark and Scruffy."

"Wha-" But Slayer Aby rushed in with the other young women. "We're ready, Mother Buffy."

"If you see Bon-bon-"

"Ribbon."

"Whatever. Take her up with you. We need another sharp-shooter."

Slayer Aby nodded sharply, grasping Mother Buffy's arm before passing deeper into the Citadel. Last to go up, Max watched the elderly woman leave her hiding place to join the fray.

* * *

Max was still watching their backs, and so he was the last one to enter the room. And the only one that Slayer Aby didn't introduce.

"No!" rang sharply behind him. But he looked back in time to have the sharp end of a gleaming red axe shaving the whiskers on his chin.

"Mother," he breathed. She looked a lot like the deadly old woman below, but dark-eyed and possibly even more battle hungry. "Mother Faith."

The axe dug a little deeper into his neck. "Just the Mother to you."

Max grunted.

"Damn he's cute. Y'all are sure I don't have to kill him."

Cheedo broke free from the knot of women in the room. "Mother!" Her hand landed on the old woman's shoulder. "This is Furiosa's Fool."

She turned and spat over her shoulder. "Should've known he was taken."

Max made a noise...gesturing to the axe at his neck.

"Oh. Yeah. That." The Mother pulled the axe away. Then she turned to the still stunned women in the room. "Chop chop, people! Unless you want to see us overrun by Bullet Buggers. Ribbon, go up and help Furiosa. Lavender, Thyme, Abundance, go to your stations. Chee-chee, you're stickin' with me. And Fool-"

"Max."

"Whatever, kid. What can you do? You any good at sharp-shooting?"

Max nodded.

"Well, get out of here! Abundance! Point him."

Slayer-Aby-Abundance winked and slapped his shoulder even as the Mother's words followed them down the stone hall. "Are we fighting a war or having a social club? Jesus!"

"Your Mothers are... They're not what I thought."

Slayer Abundance laughed. "None of them are."

Fin[ite]


End file.
